


pinioned

by sleepinnude



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Body Horror, M/M, Wing Kink, Wingfic, and i've been reading too much andre aciman, i had feeling about cas's wings ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-15
Updated: 2020-01-15
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:20:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22271722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepinnude/pseuds/sleepinnude
Summary: Imagine you're an angel. Imagine you have wings. Imagine, then, you don't. Imagine the loss is slow and painful. Imagine feeling the pull of every feather from its shaft. Imagine the bend and tear of each individual vane and barb. Imagine the twist of the bones. They were once delicate and divine. They were once beautiful. Imagine.What is an angel without wings?Imagine there was something broken on you, constantly. Imagine that it was a reminder of your failures.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 3
Kudos: 57





	pinioned

**Author's Note:**

> honestly, i just wanted to write about cas's wings.
> 
> there's some slight body horror at the beginning so be aware of that pls!  
> also, the beginning ramblings is meant to be from cas's point of view and i think it could be construed as a little ablest? so also be aware of that.

Imagine.

Imagine the feeling of fingers breaking. Imagine it being slow and painful. Imagine something more essential, something essential to your very being. Imagine your spine, breaking. Imagine it being slow and painful. Imagine someone doing it to you, imagine someone taking the knots and knobs of your vertebrae in their hands and twisting. Imagine they are delighted to do it, imagine they are gleeful with it, shrieking their delight to the skies.

Imagine you're an angel. Imagine you have wings. Imagine, then, you don't. Imagine the loss is slow and painful. Imagine feeling the pull of every feather from its shaft. Imagine the bend and tear of each individual vane and barb. Imagine the twist of the bones. They were once delicate and divine. They were once beautiful. Imagine.

What is an angel without wings?

When Castiel first shows his wings, in a barn in Illinois, it is to intimidate. It is to prove, because faith has always been Dean's problem. He finds, in years to come, that this is an impressive display -- the arc and spray of his wings. The terror of darkness closing in, the sudden susurration of the void breaching. The reveal. The shadow. The not quite reality of it, latent in their dispelling light. This is little more than parlor trick but it works, on humans and on demons alike, either other angels. The cast of them against Crowley, Anna, Raphael. Gabriel cocking joints against Asmodeus.

There's a reason, after all, that the angels bent to Lucifer. He promised them their wings reborn.

(Imagine, there was something so a part of you, and then you lost it. Imagine something so important that you would surrender Heaven to its mortal enemy to get it back.

Imagine there was something broken on you, constantly. Imagine that it was a reminder of your failures.)

When Castiel spreads his wings, now, they are tattered. He can taste every flaw of them in the air, as thick as sulfur burning. He mourns the loss of every feather, of the torn flesh, of the splintered and mishealed bone.

If you asked, Cas wouldn’t be able to answer: who can say what changed the abilities of these humans he has for so long considered his? Who can say whether it was time as a demon or time as Michael that allowed Dean to see his wings? Not the absence of light and air where his wings exist, but to actually see the wings themselves. Stretching. Arcing. The spray of their feathers, every patch of their injury.

Angels don't touch one another wings. It isn't taboo, necessarily but it isn't really done outside of the battlefield.

Dean’s hand plunged deep into Cas's wings and there is the ring of Hester's voice: _The very touch if you corrupts_. Cas has learned, though, that corruption isn't as straightforward as Heaven would have him think. His touch corrupted Dean, after all, burnt his palm deep into muscle. Some part in the depths of him wishes for the same. Wishes for the feathers to burn in the shape of Dean’s hand, so that he may wear that hand forever.

There is a hitch in Cas’s breathing as Dean curls his fingers and it brings a lip to Dean’s heartbeat. A ragged pull of his own breathing, as torn as Cas’s wings, and then the curve of Cas’s name on his tongue. Cas nods through the tears against his cheeks and he’s not sure when he started crying. He’s not sure why, either. Not pain, not pleasure. More the release of it, of finally having Dean’s hand on him. On these, his wings, so abused. Corrupted.

With effort, Cas unfolds them fully, turns them forward, collapses them over Dean. The whole of Dean’s room buzzes with their divine energy, crackles. A gasp punches out of Dean and he pitches his head forward to rest on Cas’s shoulder. “I never thought,” he says, pressed into the skin of Cas’s neck. “I didn’t know. I didn’t know they were like this.”

“They were greater,” Cas murmurs. His arms are around Dean but he has his head tipped back, spine straight. If he concentrates, he can feel the ripple of his Grace filling the room. “Once.”

Dean turns his face -- not into Cas’s neck but opposite, to sink his nose and cheek into the covert feathers. And they were never greater, these wings, because they never before had Dean's touch. They were lesser for it, he was lesser for it. “Cas,” Dean says into the soft of afterfeather. And it must be a prayer, because his voice echoes through Cas’s being, electric, like Grace. His name over Dean’s lips is neuropathy in his fingertips, gripping low in his stomach. Or maybe it’s not the fact of Prayer, at all, but rather the fact that it is Dean and Dean is saying his name to him.

When their lips meet, Cas’s wings span out with a sudden jerk. They fill the room at their apogee and spare feathers cast like remains of some spell. Dean smiles into the kiss and Cas’s wings rejoice.

**Author's Note:**

> witness me on [tumblr](https://disasterfreewill.tumblr.com/)


End file.
